About the Artist

Kathryn Covier Hannah (K C) has been an artist-at-heart since her early childhood in Detroit. Although she has lived in several locations (Germany, Ohio, Florida, Fresno, Sacramento), she recently settled in Lake of the Pines in Nevada County, California. Over the years she has experimented with crayons, watercolors, clay sculpture, paper art, oil painting, pastels, prints and a few other media. Her love of art led her to buy and manage an art gallery while raising her children. More recently, she worked as a consultant and marketing specialist for nonprofits throughout California. A few years ago, K C and her husband, Larry, signed up for a weekend workshop in glass bead-making. The experience redirected her life. She now spends several hours a day "on the torch," i.e., making glass beads that she can use in her jewelry designs. K C's jewelry is not limited to glass, although that is her favorite medium. Her designs are all one-of-a-kind and may include sterling silver, pearls, gemstones, gold or gold-filled beads and findings, chain, leather, charms, ceramic beads, Swarovski Austrian crystals, vintage beads and findings and even ancient artifacts.

I love designing jewelry, especially when I can incorporate my own lampworked glass beads. "Lampworking" is the term that describes how I make my glass beads. I manipulate a rod of Venetian glass in a 2000+ degree flame, sometimes spending as much as an hour to make just one bead. I'm fascinated by glass, its ancient history as well as its potential. "Natural glass,' in the form of obsidian created by volcanoes, was used by our ancestors to make tools and weapons. No one knows when the first person discovered how to make glass, but it was a well-established industry in Syria by 1700 B.C. My personal bead collection includes the work of ancient glass bead-makers as well as fine examples from some of today's masters. I never cease to wonder at the beauty and ingenuity reflected in these tiny works of art.